


Am I Really Not Good Enough?

by apocalypseGeneticist



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Depression, Gay Bashing, Homophobia, M/M, Suicide
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2011-12-07
Updated: 2011-12-08
Packaged: 2017-10-27 01:10:05
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,422
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/289919
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/apocalypseGeneticist/pseuds/apocalypseGeneticist
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dave Strider has to deal with the sudden attempted suicide of his boyfriend, John Egbert.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

"John! John, are you there? Nurse, where did you take him? He's gone, I can't see him- John! John, please say something!"  
I had had enough. I stood on the table in the middle of the emergency room, looked around, and yelled as loud as I could.  
"Whichever orderly is pushing a stretcher carrying a kid with black hair and big glasses, stop walking and raise your goddamn hand right. Fucking. Now."  
A dark-skinned, slightly overweight man wearing orderly scrubs raised his shaking hand. Apparently not many people did this. Or he was easily scared.  
My name is Dave Strider, and my boyfriend tried to kill himself an hour ago.

\--

I sat at the side of the bed, holding John's hand and trying not to break down. I watched as his chest rose and fell with each breath. I tried to block out the memory that was still fresh in my mind; barely hours old, in fact: that of screaming and crying and hoping that his chest would move, willing his lungs to work, and becoming more and more desperate when, second after second, they failed to.  
I reached out my free hand to his neck, touching the skin still tender from rope burn. I fought back tears. No need to be emotional here. Have to be level-headed for the doctor.  
My breath caught as I held his head in my hand. He was fast asleep and probably wouldn't wake up for a few hours at least. "Why did you do it?" I asked him, but his eyes were closed, his brain off. He wasn't going to answer me.

\--

The doctor came in around 2 am. I didn't know whether to feel sorry for him or scream at him. He treated the situation like it was completely routine. I don't know if that's meant to be calming for patients or loved ones or whoever he's putting this show on for, but by the time he left, my hands were balled into white-knuckled fists and I could feel the vein in my neck ready to burst. I managed not to smash his face in, and thought i had earned myself a reward.  
I walked to the nearest vending machine and got myself a soda. John was so vehemently against carbonated drinks that it was downright impossible trying to convince him just to let me drink them. I sat in an empty patient room and stared at the floor. I had found a small window in between the two hardest parts of the morning- having to deal with the doctor and the John's inevitable waking up.  
Half of me wanted to watch his eyes open and see light again, see me again. The other half wanted to be long gone before he started to wake up. I didn't know what kind of reaction a failed suicide attempt gets but I couldn't imangine it was anywhere close to positive. I doubted he would wake up and think to himself "Wow, good thing I fucked up killing myself, I didn't really wanna anyway."  
When I got back to the room, the nurses had cleaned him up, taken the skin and blood out from underneath his fingernails, and put some extra pillows under his head. I kissed him on the forehead and whispered, "If you pull this shit again I'm going to put Casey up for adoption." It was a joke threat, and an empty one at that. Nonetheless, it fell on deaf ears. John wouldn't wake up for another two hours.


	2. Chapter 2

I was just dozing off to sleep in the chair next to John's bed when he woke up. He stirred ever so slightly, and my eyes shot open. I sat bolt upright. I guess I wanted to be there after all. I stared at him as his face scrunched up in discomfort. His eyes opened so slowly I could practically hear them creaking. He looked so utterly confused at what was going on, and before I could think, I had thrown myself overtop of him. I was sobbing but I wouldn't let tears come. For some reason I wouldn't allow that to myself. I felt his hand in my hair and I quickly stood up.  
I punched him. Nearly as hard as I could, I punched him in the dead centre of his chest. He looked even more confused now. Expecting never to wake up again and suddenly coming to in a hospital bed, then being hit by your boyfriend must be disorienting. Even more so before I realized that he didn't have his glasses on. I picked them up and hurriedly put them on his face.  
He looked at me. "Dave, I-" he managed to get out before I cut him off.  
"Do you know what the fuck just happened, Egbert? I just spend three hours sitting in a hospital room waiting for you to wake up. Know what happened before that? I dragged you into the ER by myself. You're not that heavy but Jesus, your deadweight is impossible. Wanna know what happened before that? I ran twelve red lights trying to get from our place to the hospital parking lot. How about before that? I saw you hanging from a noose in the middle of our fucking closet, passed out from lack of air. Now I don't know what fucking happened before that, so why don't you goddamn enlighten me?" The last word nearly came out as a squeak; my voice cracked throughout the entire rant that I all but spat at him.  
He stayed silent for another few minutes. It looked as if he was calculating his sentence; trying to make what he did somehow less horrible or more reasonable.  
"Dave, I'm so sorry. I'm not really sure what happened."  
"Well, first of all, nooses aren't meant to choke you to death. They're supposed to snap your neck, idiot."  
"Okay, well-"  
"If you say 'duly noted' or 'I'll keep that in mind' I'm going to punch you again."  
"That's not what I was going to say. I suppose you deserve an explanation for what happened."  
"Fucking right I do."  
"It was about last month."  
The month before, John and I had been walking home from a date when four big guys jumped us. I guess they saw us holding hands because they pushed me down and the biggest guy stepped on me. He kept his foot right on my chest, pinning me down for ten minutes while the other three dragged John into an alley and beat him. They kicked him in the ribs, broke two of his fingers, and rolled him onto his back so that one of the guys could kneel right over him. The guy punched him repeatedly, relentlessly. I mean the kid was honest to god beating the life out of John. The entire time I fought the big guy stepping on me, but it was no use. There was nothing I could do but watch the kid I loved get beaten half to death. Finally, the guys let up. The guy on me pushed his foot down one last time, cracking one of my ribs, and joined the other three who had already walked away. I got up as quickly as I could have in my injured state and rushed to John, the pain in my chest searing red-hot behind my eyes. He was missing three teeth and his nose and one of his eye sockets were broken. I walked him to the hospital where we were both treated and released after a few days. It was another week before what they kept screaming at John would stop echoing in my ears.  
 _This is what you get for being a faggot!_  
"Last month? John, please say you're lying. Or even joking." I would have preferred a sick joke to what I knew he was going to say next.  
"I'm not. What if that's all I am? Some worthless faggot who doesn't deserve to live?" Tears began to form behind his glasses. "What if I'm not good enough for life?" He began sobbing, and I told him to move over.  
"W-what?" He said between heaving breaths.  
"I said shove over. Make some room, I'm coming in."  
I laid there with him, in the tiny hospital bed, all night. Nurses came and went. Every one of them told me that what I was doing was against the rules, but none of them made me get up. I think they could see from John's state that he needed it.


End file.
